


Under Paris Skies

by StellarLibraryLady



Series: Dancing To (And Living By) The Oldies [22]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies), Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Alpaca Blanket, Apache Dancers, Bistro, Cabarets, Cadets, Dancing, Falling In Love, First Meetings, First Time (Implied), Les Danse Apache Parisienne, Love, M/M, Melancholy, Nudity, Paris (City), Pre-Relationship, Starfleet Cadets, Zine: Spiced Peaches, alternative universe, song related
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-26
Packaged: 2020-01-24 03:03:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18562606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StellarLibraryLady/pseuds/StellarLibraryLady
Summary: Star Fleet Cadets Kirk and McCoy have different plans when they find themselves in Paris, the City of Love.  Kirk is seeking casual romance while McCoy simply wants to protect himself from more heartbreak.  Neither expects to meet the mysterious Apache dancer who only has eyes for McCoy.Appeared in Spiced Peaches LV.





	Under Paris Skies

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by "Under Paris Skies" sung by Andy Williams.

"I wasn't smart and I lost my heart under Paris skies.  
Watch what you do, the same thing can happen to you."

Even if the young woman wasn't singing the lyrics of the sentimental song as if her heart would break, the sounds of the crying concertina behind her would remind any listener of precious love won and then somehow lost forever. And for the two young Star Fleet cadets breathlessly watching her tender performance, each was suffering along with her as only the romantic young can.

"Isn’t she something?" Kirk marveled in awe as his enchanted eyes glistened in his handsome face. Anyone seeing him for the first time could fall in love with that part of him without ever realizing until much later that his eyes were just part of what the handsome cadet had to offer. “Just listen to her, Bones. It’s like she’s singing only to us.”

"That's what everyone thinks," McCoy grumbled back. But he knew it was true, at least for him. Didn't he have enough lost loves behind him for three men?

Kirk was worried, especially for his friend. He knew McCoy’s track record with romance as well as McCoy did. “Just watch yourself, okay? That’s all I’m asking, Bones.”

McCoy flinched. “I’m not exactly a novice in the love department, you know.” Sometimes it bothered McCoy that others knew of his romantic failures. It hurt to acknowledge that he was such a loser to Cupid’s arrows.

“No, you just seem to have some sort of target on you somewhere that signals those out to break hearts that you are prime and ready to have it done to you again.”

“I suppose that’s why you leave me alone, huh? I’d be no challenge to you.”

“I don’t even know if you’d realize that I was around,” Kirk muttered. “You’re too busy tending to the scars on your heart.”

“I might have a good reason, don’t you suppose?" But he didn't want to sound too pathetic. Nobody likes being around a deadbeat like that, and McCoy didn't want to jeopardize his friendship with Kirk. "Anyway, what difference does it make to you? Wait! Are you carrying a torch?! For me?! You?! You who could have anyone, male or female, you wanted?!”

“I’d be too afraid of getting trapped in the debris when your heart broke completely over me.” Yeah, there had been a time when he’d thought about McCoy in that way, but he had decided he wanted McCoy more as a friend. But, still… there were times... even yet.... when the sunlight caught McCoy just so... or the moonlight....

Kirk brought himself back to the present. “I won’t do any of that to you, Bones,” he reassured his friend with a warm, gentle smile. “Your friendship is more important to me than a few sweaty sessions with you between the sheets. I just want you to be careful while we’re here. You’re so vulnerable.”

“Then why, for all that’s Holy, did you bring me to Paris?!”

Kirk flinched. “Because this is where the conference is being held, and I wanted you with me for it. It’s not everyday that cadets get to be part of the contingency to represent Star Fleet at an international meeting. And we'll get to have a little bit of fun in this city, too! I can practically guarantee that! We won't be in meetings all the time! Besides, maybe you can get over your streak of bad luck with love if you take it head-on here in the City of Love.” He winked. "You know, challenge it to a fight on its own turf."

“Fight fire with fire? Are you sure about all of this? Or am I just gonna be your wing-man again?”

Kirk didn’t even try to stop the smirk from crossing his face. “I’d be stupid to ignore it if it’s slapped up against me now, wouldn’t I? If someone acts interested in me, I'm sure as hell not gonna chase them away with a stick. I'll just let the city take me where it wants to lead me. And if that just so happens to be somebody's bedroom--” He shrugged and let his sentence drop away.

But McCoy understood him all right.

“And it generally does get slapped up against you, doesn’t it?” McCoy agreed with a sigh. “You’re kind of a magnet when it comes to someone wanting a little extracurricular activities with no strings attached.”

“That’s the best way, Bones. Have your fun, then leave with no regrets. You’d be better if you played the game that way, too. Casual sex, my man. You can’t beat it, and I’m hoping that a lot of it comes my way. I'm all set to be real casual!”

McCoy glanced around their murky surroundings at other people he could barely see. “So that’s why we’re in this cave? Hoping we’ll get something slapped up against us?”

Kirk took in the dimly lit room thick with other drinkers. “This isn’t a cave. It just looks like it.”

McCoy felt more distaste than Kirk had. “Could’ve fooled me.”

“This is a bistro. This is the sleazy side of Paris nightlife. Paris after dark. When love comes out and restraint goes away.”

“I know. We’ll probably be lucky if we don’t get a knife in the back while we’re soaking up the local color,” McCoy grumbled.

Kirk grinned. “It won’t be that bad, Bones. You might be at risk to lose some money and waking up with a helluva hangover, but not of losing your life. In fact, if you’re lucky, you’ll be party to some really great unseemly loving.” Kirk winked. “I know that’s what I’m hoping for, at least for myself.”

“So we came to this dive, risking everything, just because you’re horny!” McCoy grumbled.

“When in Paris, do as the Parisians do,” Kirk suggested.

“You could’ve hooked up with someone back in San Francisco, you know. You didn’t need to come this far just to get laid!”

Kirk rolled his eyes with enthusiasm. “But it’s Paris, Bones! Paris! That’s what happens here! You get laid! By someone dark and swarthy and a little bit dangerous, if you’re lucky.”

“Come to Paris with me, you said,” McCoy chanted. “I’ll show you the real town, you said.”

“And that’s what I’m doing.” Kirk swept the room with his arm. "Gay Paree is at our feet! Anything's possible here!"

“If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather go to the nightclub shows at the Lido or the Moulin Rouge. This place is a little too realistic for my taste. Most of the guys in here look like they got knives strapped to their legs. And the women probably have traps set for men further up their legs, say about the place where their legs come together.”

“That’s what I’m counting on!” Kirk said with a lazy smile.

“You and everyone else!” McCoy snapped. “Sex and crime seem to be running rampant around here!”

“That’s the charm of the place, Bones. Just wait until you see the Apache dancers.”

“I expect that the couple will be the epitome of this whole sordid setting.”

And they were.

"What did I tell you, Bones?" Kirk asked with a smirk.

"I'll be damned!" McCoy mumbled in awe.

"Probably." Kirk's grin deepened. "But hopefully not for watching these folks."

"Shh!" McCoy demanded.

The well-shaped male and female Apache dancers were sex personified, or so McCoy thought as he watched the physical and sensuous dance unfold only a few feet in front of them in the darkened nightspot. They were a handsome couple in the spotlight, especially the male dancer in his striped top and beret set sideways on his dark hair. Both dancers were dark and seemed to be what people thought of when they pictured gypsies in their minds.

Kirk seemed to be watching the endowed woman slither across the floor, and she seemed to be watching the handsome Kirk watch her. But who could blame her? Nothing new there. Most eyes were generally riveted on Kirk’s pretty face. Kirk probably didn’t even notice it anymore. And if he did notice the attention of someone he coveted, he probably just thought that it was his fatal charm. Part of it was his charm, of course. But what struck the eye of the stranger and held their attention was Kirk’s beauty. The woman dancer was no exception.

After the dancers disappeared in back, Kirk jumped to his feet.

“Let’s go meet them, Bones.”

“But we just can’t go back there uninvited!”

“Oh, yes, we can. Come on.”

McCoy stumbled after him. “But they might not want to meet us--”

Kirk grinned. “Oh, I think that they will.”

And, of course, Jim Kirk was correct in his assumption. In fact, the black-haired woman with sultry dark eyes practically draped herself all over him in the small dressing room that she was sharing with her dancing partner.

After a few moments of enjoying her embraces and mumbled murmurings, Kirk said with a satisfied, but self-conscious grin,“Well, gee, Bones, I guess the young lady wants to show me the waterfront.”

“Among other things,” McCoy muttered, but Kirk paid him no attention as he gladly followed the voluptuous woman who pulled him through the backdoor of the shadowy theater without anymore hesitation.

In the suddenly quiet dressing room, McCoy turned to the woman’s deserted partner. The man was halfway watching McCoy, but seemed unconcerned with the fact that he had been tossed aside for a good-looking stranger.

“I am sorry, about that,” McCoy apologized. “I guess that they hit it off.” He knew he had no reason to smooth over the abrupt departure, but he felt sorry for the male Apache dancer. The guy seemed so lonesome sitting there all alone by himself.

After a quiet moment while the Apache dancer was probably thinking over the situation, he shrugged. “It is not my concern what Marie Colette does or with whom.” He glanced at McCoy fully for the first time, and McCoy could feel those dark eyes taking him in with interest. “It is kind that you have expressed your regard for my discomfort, though. I thank you for that.”

“She is not your woman then?”

“She is her own woman,” the dancer muttered. “She is the niece of the people who raised me.” His dark eyes bore into McCoy. “They found me, an abandoned baby in the forests of Romania, named me Guido, and took me into their protection as their own. I have no other family, no other life.”

McCoy wondered why the man named Guido, apparently a Gypsy, was telling him all these things, a stranger whom he had met just a few moments ago.

Apparently, Guido thought the same thing, for he leaped to his feet and turned his back. “Forgive me. I rarely tell this much about myself, especially to someone I do not even know.”

McCoy felt that he needed to reassurance Guido. “That’s alright. We all have to share information occasionally. What good would we be if we couldn’t open an ear to the soul of another human being?”

Guido shot him a look. “And if I am not human?”

McCoy blinked. “You sure as hell look human to me.” McCoy knit his eyebrows together. "Are you saying you ain't human?"

“Well, half human.” Guido pulled off the beret that had been holding his longish hair close to his head. That’s when his pointed ears became apparent. Guido smoothed down his unruly dark hair in case there was any question about him having those ears.

“Oh,” McCoy breathed deeply as he nodded in understanding. It all made sense now. Guido must have known much prejudice in his young life because of his mixed heritage. No wonder he welcomed an excuse to wear a beret. “Vulcan, too. Right?”

Guido nodded. “And if I was not wearing makeup, you could see the color of my real skin. It is green tinted.”

McCoy shrugged. “So? You’re half human and half Vulcan. So what?”

Guido looked at him sharply. “It does not matter to you?”

“What’s in a man’s heart is more important. At least it is to me. Isn’t that so with you?”

Guido nodded. “There are not many like you.”

McCoy grinned. “That’s what Jim says, too, but I think he was meaning something different than any lack of prejudice in me.”

“Jim?”

“My friend. The one who left with Marie Colette.”

Guido nodded. “You are close friends with him?”

“Yes. Very good. He is a good man. Has principals out the ying yang."

"Out the ying yang?" Guido echoed.

"In abundance." McCoy grinned. "What's wrong? Never heard that saying?"

"Even though I have been here for several years, I still have problems with a lot of the slang expressions on Terran. They are not logical."

"I could see that. Anyway, as I was saying, Jim is a good person. Marie Colette will be safe with him. He’s just after a good time.”

“So is she,” Guido said with a deep sigh. “Sometimes the young are not cautious enough.”

“And sometimes, older people are too cautious.”

“Yes.” Guido studied McCoy thoughtfully. “You are not as old as you act. You have had many heartaches in your young life, though.”

McCoy grinned. “Are you a fortune teller, too?”

“Sometimes, one does not need to be a diviner of the future to understand what suffering someone else has felt.”

McCoy felt an instant recognition of a kindred soul. “Yes,” he answered in awe, struck by that recognition.

“I can see in your eyes that you have known much pain.”

“As you yourself have,” McCoy answered, as if he could not do otherwise.

"If we are here to learn and to experience, then we are indeed fulfilling our destinies," Guido murmured as though he was reciting something he had spoken many times before or had at least thought many times.

McCoy recognized a fellow sojourner. "Boy, that's the truth! And if the proof of that knowledge is heartache, we've got that by the ton!"

Guido studied McCoy. He recognized a fellow sojourner, too, and he smiled softly.

McCoy returned the soft smile that had a lot of sadness shading it. He hadn't felt this contended with someone he'd just met in a long while.

And apparently Guido did not, either. With the soft smile still gracing his face, he stood and extended his hand. “Will you walk along the waterfront with me?” he asked. When McCoy hesitated, Guido reassured him. “We will go in the opposite direction that Marie Colette took your friend.”

“Good,” McCoy said with a languid smile. “I would not want their company.”

“Neither would I.”

And McCoy felt the same thrill he had experienced when Guido had first concentrated on him completely. Like those dark eyes had stripped away all of McCoy’s pretenses and clothing and had liked what he was now observing.

Outside, in the alley behind the cafe, the night air, chilly with the nip of winter fog that makes one happy for warm clothing, caused McCoy to shiver. But he was not uncomfortable. A few degrees chillier, a stronger wind even, would guide one to seek a cheerful open fire. But now it was an agreeable cold that make McCoy feel romantic and nostalgic and companionable.

“I do not appreciate Paris in the winter,” Guido mumbled. “Warmer climes would suit my body better.”

“Then why stay?”

Guido shot him an unguarded look. “Because my people are here. Is that not why you are where you are?”

“In Star Fleet Academy?” McCoy grinned wistfully. “I guess my people are scattered.” He glanced at Guido. “I suppose that Jim Kirk, the guy with Marie Colette, is my family now.”

“I understand. The people I am with are my family simply because they include me.” Guido looked off into the scene before him without really seeing. “I have a father somewhere. And a mother. Maybe even brothers and sisters.”

“Haven’t you ever wanted to find them?”

“We get complacent with our lot in life. What few shreds we have are better than nothing.” He glanced at McCoy. “Do you not find that so, also?”

McCoy’s smile was sad. “Probably.”

“I feel comfortable with you,” Guido said softly. “And that surprises me.”

“Oh?”

“I rarely relate to someone new, but I am to you.”

“Why do you suppose that is?” McCoy asked. Even to him, it sounded like a taunt, even if he had tried to soften it. He had felt the attraction to this Guido in the dressing room. But out here in the raw elements of a chilly Parisian winter night, McCoy was tingling with the awareness of Guido that was pressing against him with urgent intimacy.

Guido stopped, turned to McCoy, and looked long into his eyes. “I do not know,” he said at last. “But I intend to find out.” And with that said, Guido pushed McCoy into the shadowy space between two buildings, shoved him against the damp, cold wall, and embraced him.

“Now, what?” McCoy dared, hoping that Guido had not heard the gulp in his voice.

“This,” Guido answered and pressed his mass against McCoy’s body.

McCoy drew his breath in sharply, not even trying to hide the effect of all of that muscular frame against him. It felt good, real good, shoved up against him that way. He wanted to feel smothered and short of breath. But McCoy knew that it was more than the closeness of that alien body on his. It was the warm breath in the chilly air. The foreignness of the guy. The hardness of an erection pressed against McCoy's torso....

"And..." McCoy demanded, not trying to hide the gulp this time.

“And this,” Guido breathed as his hands ran over McCoy’s body.

McCoy felt faint and grabbed onto Guido so he would not fall.

“And this.” Guido could barely speak for the passion he was feeling. Then he gave into his lusts and claimed McCoy’s lips in a brutal kiss.

McCoy moaned, but did not break the kiss. He could not. Paris and the Apache dancer in his arms had him under their spell.

“Do you have somewhere we can go?” McCoy managed to gasp and surprised himself at his own brazenness.

“My rooms are near. They are not much.”

“Do they have walls? Somewhere for privacy?” McCoy demanded. He knew that if Guido didn’t lead him somewhere sheltered quickly, the street would have to be witness to their desires.

“They will be sufficient for our purposes,” Guido answered.

If it was any consolation, Guido sounded as distracted as McCoy felt. All that either could think about were the location of their hands and what their lips were doing to each other. Well, and finding somewhere away from prying eyes. What they wanted to do to each other required no witnesses.

 

McCoy lay on his stomach and wondered why the air did not chill his bare skin. It must be this marvelous white fur he was snuggled into so nicely. Or maybe it was his nearness to the marvelously other naked body that had kept him so gloriously warm all the time that they had been making love.

“What kind of pelt is this?” he mumbled as he fingered the white fur.

“Alpaca,” Guido answered. His dark eyes were locked on the naked body sprawled on his bed. He seemed to be getting as much pleasure from the sight as his whole body had received from McCoy surrendering to him the moment they had crashed into Guido’s rooms.

“I’ve never felt anything so warm,” McCoy murmured as he nestled his face into the soft fur. He glanced up at Guido. “Except for one thing, when it entered my body. And sent me to Heaven,” he whispered. “I’ve never had a hot poker inside me before, and it felt great.”

Guido’s only answer was to run his hand down McCoy’s back, through the dip at the waist, and back up to rest on an up-thrust hip.

“You are so slender,” Guido murmured. “Except for the fat in your buttocks.”

“I’d play hell not having that layer of fat,” McCoy murmured back. “I wouldn’t have anything to sit down on.”

Guido ran his hand down McCoy’s leg, then dragged it back up to the rounded fat. Guido gently pinched the fat between his fingers, and McCoy hummed. Guido drew the fat aside, and McCoy gasped. He knew that Guido could see the secret opening to his body.

“Does it look okay?” McCoy wanted to know.

“A little pouty and reddened. I think that it is angry.”

“It has a reason. I’ve never left it unprotected like that before.”

“Are you sorry?”

“No,” McCoy replied hoarsely. He rolled slightly and held out his hand. “I’m ready to leave it unprotected again, if you think that you’re ready to take advantage of its innocence again.”

Guido gave McCoy a crafty smile. “I do believe that I will be able to deflower you to the satisfaction of both of us. How could I not when I have such a sight to inspire me?”

McCoy took Guido’s hand and pulled him down to the bed with a smile. It was the only other enticement that McCoy had at the moment, but it was enough. Guido was well satisfied with what he found waiting for him.

 

“Bones! Where in the hell have you been?! You’ve missed most of the conference! I started to think that you had died!”

McCoy gave him a cryptic look. “There were times I thought I had. The ‘little deaths’ were a delight.”

Kirk frowned in thought. “You got lucky?”

McCoy grinned. “Lucky. Scored. Oh, yeah! All of the above!”

“Who?”

“Guido.”

Kirk frowned again. “The Apache dancer? Marie Colette’s friend?”

“Yeah. Him,” McCoy said wistfully.

Kirk misunderstood. “Bones. I’m sorry. Oh, hell, I’m sorry that this had to happen to you.”

“Why? We’re in Paris, the City of Love. How could I do otherwise?”

Kirk looked relieved. “Than it’s okay? You and Guido had a fling and then parted ways? No heartache afterwards?”

“No heartache afterwards.”

“That’s great, Bones! Now you can do recreational sex without falling in love.”

“I didn’t say that.”

Kirk frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I fell in love. Hard. So did he.”

“And you can just walk away from him? Bones, that makes me more worried about you than if you were grieving about a broken heart. I’d hate to think that you’ve grown callous about love.”

“Nothing of the sort.”

“You aren’t making a whole lot of sense you know.”

“Perhaps I will if I explain Guido’s parting gifts to me, a striped shirt and a black beret.”

“His Apache dancer’s outfit?”

McCoy looked contended. “Oh, and a white alpaca rug that’s the warmest thing I’ve ever been wrapped up in.” He grinned sheepishly. “With one exception.”

“But what will he do if he’s not going to be an Apache dancer anymore? How can he stay with his people?”

“He has other people. Vulcans. He wants to try to find them. He thinks that he may even be the lost son of Sarek of Vulcan.”

“How does he propose to do that? He’d have to go into space to hunt for Vulcans.”

“That’s what I told him. So he’s joining Star Fleet, too. As smart as he is, he can soon catch up and graduate with us.”

“Bones, may I remind you that we’re both going to make it through Star Fleet faster than most people?”

“This guy is smart, Jim. And we’ll help him.”

“And you’re in love with him. Just like that.”

McCoy grinned all over himself. “Yep. Just like that.”

“And he’s made you happy. For that reason alone, I’ll help him as much as I can. Who knows? Maybe we can serve on the same starship together. If he’s as smart as you say, he could probably help us, too.”

“Oh, he’s smart. He's made me believe in love again.”

“You know, Bones, I think that you provided the same miracle in him. I think that he would have stayed an Apache dancer with the Gypsies unless you wouldn’t have come along.”

“I guess it was a good idea that I came along to Paris with you after all then, wasn’t it?”

“I think it made the difference in two people’s lives. You know, not everyone who falls in love in Paris is doomed to heartbreak afterwards. I think that you two just made me believe in true love again.”

“I certainly hope so, Jim. This feeling is to be shared, and I would hate not to be able to share it with my friends.”

As McCoy's heart glowed with the prospects of his now rosy future, he realized what the haunting allure of Paris had all been about for all of those countless centuries she had ruled on the banks of the River Seine. It was the place where the hearts of all true lovers dwelled, no matter where their bodies happened to be located. McCoy knew that it was the place where he had lost his heart in the arms of a wild, exotic lover, only to have it returned to him along with the heart of a man who had surrendered to him because he wanted to and not because he had to.

No matter how far away from her they may travel in the years ahead, the idea of Paris would be with them forever. And they would own a part of her just as she owned a part of them.

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing of Star Trek, its characters, and/or its story lines. I also own nothing of the estate of the late Andy Williams nor do I own anything of the song "Under Paris Skies."


End file.
